The Rise of an Empire: The Story of Amazon.com
Jeff Bezos, the creator of Amazon.com, quickly realized that his aspirations in life would completely transform after stumbling upon the percentage of how much the World Wide Web was growing, annually. That staggering number, flourishing at 2,300%, was all that Bezos needed to immediately understand the amount of success he could achieve, selling products online. Almost immediately, Jeff left his Wall Street job at D.E. Shaw, a company that specializes in computer science applications in the stock market, where over the years he rose to Vice President. Jeff’s co workers urged him to stay, but his reasoning to rather to try and fail, than never try at all was very apparent to his team. Although his coworkers had warned him that they might be competing against each other, Jeff was willing to accept that risk. He stated that he “might sincerely regret not having participated in this thing called the Internet… that I thought was going to be a revolutionizing event. When I thought about it that way… it was incredibly easy to make the decision.” Jeff’s decision to leave behind his old job and life would later evidently pay off.
Jeff and his beloved wife, Mackenzie, moved to Seattle after quitting at D.E. Shaw, ultimately deciding that the immense amount of Seattle’s hi-tech talents would be advantageous to him and his upcoming work. He started to plan out the potentials of opening an online bookstore that would later become one of the most prosperous companies in the world, Amazon.com. Jeff narrowed down a list to the 5 most promising products he could potentially sell on his new website- compact discs, computer software, hardware, videos and discs. Jeff’s first employee, Shel Kaphan, was fully convinced to work for him after hearing of his ideas over breakfast at the Sash Mill Cafe in Santa Cruz. Still to this day, he has a reputation at Amazon.com as a stereotypical pessimist, repeatedly telling his co workers that the company’s systems are “always on the verge of implosion”, due to his past work experiences at different companies which had almost always failed. Regardless of Kaphan’s prior involvement in the business industry, he full heartedly trusted Bezos with his plan.
The initial prototype for Amazon.com was created in the garage of Jeff’s suburban home in Bellevue, Seattle. Along with Kaphan, Bezos recruited a contractor named Paul Barton-Davis. For the next several months, Bezos garage would soon be filled with various types of extension cords, because there were not enough power outlets for the necessary equipment, such as the Sun Sparc Stations. Over these couple of months, the first million dollars that the trio needed had been accumulated from Wall Street investors, college friends, and friends of Bezos parents who had been persuaded to help him with his upcoming project. Eventually, with the help of Kaphan, Amazon.com launched to the public in 1995. Almost immediately, the company was successful, earning $20,000 a week by the end of the first month. “It was clear there was a trend here… Every week, the revenues went up.” said Tom Alberg, a co-director of Amazon.com. However, regardless of the numbers, the company was flawed. James Marcus, Amazon.com’s 55th employee, says that Amazon.com seemed “quite rudimentary” by first glance, telling us that there was a “huge catalogue of several hundreds of thousands of books, but there was no content in that catalogue.” Originally, the company had no advertising budget, so initial sales were generated merely by word of mouth, which contrasted from any other company on the market during that time.
Amazon.com’s mantra, “Get Big Fast” surely summed up all of Jeff’s goals for his company. “Everything had to be on steroids…all growth had to be on steroids” says Marcus. By the end of 1996, the company had reached 15.7 million dollars in sales. On may 15th, 1997, the stock began trading under NASDAQ at $29.25, which was 12 dollars higher than its asking price, and by the end of 1997, the value of the stock tripled. After their high-volume of sales, the company expanded their staff and product line, which in the end, paid off for the company. Despite the its high success rate, in 2000, stock prices slumped to $5.97 and Jeff had to take drastic measures, laying off many staff members. By January 2002, Amazon.com stock prices finally rebounded and the company started partnering with more than 400 companies. In 2007, the Kindle was presented to the public. Being an instant hit, the Kindle sold out nationwide in just 5 hours. However, almost immediately, critics everywhere such as John Grisham reprimanded Amazon.com for the Kindle. He argued that the “whole industry will change… we will soon lose publishers, bookstores…” On the other hand, the many supporters of the Kindle said that it would “build a bridge between authors and their readers, that in the past, never really existed.” In addition to the company’s extensive product line, in 2011, Amazon.com stepped into the video streaming and music market. Jeff Bezos, now with a net worth of 25 billion and being credited to having invented the world’s largest online retailer, continues to “go for it, if he sees something where Amazon can make a little piece of money and help its margins…” says Nicholas Carlson, Editor-in-Chief of Business Insider. Jeff’s achievements will continue to cultivate and expand, as will his company.
Despite the immense amount of success that Amazon.com has obtained for Jeff and his co-founders, there have been downsides to it. Across Britain, bookshops has been closing at the rate of one per week. Linda Jones, a small bookstore owner in the U.K., has lost sales because of, what she believes, Amazon.com. “I love books, and I love bookshops, but I just cannot afford to keep putting money into the business” she says. Further, twenty years ago in the United States, there were about 4,000 independent bookshops, now only about 1,900 remain. “A civilization without retail bookstores is unimaginable. Like shrines and other sacred meeting places, bookstores are essential artifacts of human nature. The feel of a book taken from the shelf and held in the hand is a magical experience, linking writer to reader.” says Jason Epstein, an American editor and publisher. Amazon.com’s one-click ordering option, Prime and the very popular Kindle are only a few of its advantages that keeps people coming back for more, but are also the reasons why places like Barnes and Nobles are going bankrupt.
The wealth accumulated by Amazon.com can be accredited to Jeff Bezos authentic and innovative ideas. In the early days, his original plan for an online bookstore was just the start to the later birth of a tremendous networked platform, presently displaying massive amounts of products to be sold. Now, dominating 10% of North American E-Commerce and acquiring over 117,000 employees worldwide, Amazon.com shows no signs of ceasing its rapid increase in sales, locations and product offerings.